Just a thought.. given that we're all from different universities, has everyone already contacted the PSAs and MSAs at their old universities to see what they are doing for the earthquake victims? ADP could help facilitate in sending the money.

Should ADP start contacting universities to see what their students are doing?

Like Mohammad said, it is very critical to get the non-Pakistanis involved as soon as possible. Tomorrow is the beginning of the work week and most of them would have heard the news by now. I am not worried about Pakistanis donating to the cause but the real challenge is

'How to get the non-Pakistanis (individual and corporates) to donate in the next 48 hours?'

I want a few people to focus on this question and come up with several options that ADP can exercise.

PSAs around the country can play a huge role in getting this message across. Our website address, in this case, is good enough marketing message to reach out to the non-Pakistanis. As soon as the relief webpage is up and running - lets ask the PSAs to announce it to all and sundry in their respective school/colleges.

Dur-re-Afzal from PAGB called me to ask if ADP wants to join hands to raise funds collectively next Sunday evening - 6 pm. Other Boston based organizations like APNE (Association of Pakistani Physicians of New England) are also involved. I have agreed that ADP will participate in this fundraiser, the details which will go out shortly.

I have asked Dure to add a link of our Relief Page to PAGB site AND send out an announcement to their subscribers that relief fund collection has started. I have also asked her to inform people, especially working professionals, to encourage their respective company employees to donate for the cause.

My friends in Pakistan at NCA have started a fantastic effort to help the victims. There are about 200 NCA students involved in the effort. They call themselves the NCA Trust Fund.

They are going with the goods directly to muzaffarad, balakot, mansehra and abbottabad to distibute things themselves. They've managed to get the army to give them free transportation (trucks). They are working with the army ordinance services and sending out several truckloads tomorrow evening.In the span of 2 days they have raised 35 lakh rupees. (5 lakhs from lahore and 25 lakhs from the karachi gymkhana).

At present theyNEED tents, mattresses, bedding, clothing, WATER (essential!), dry foods and medication. I am attaching their flyer to this email.

Currently they are taking teams of doctors to the area to assess what medications are needed.

They will have a bank account set up by tomorrow in Prime Bank.

I have personally worked with people leading this effort and know them to be credible.

As far as organizations go- I worked this summer with the Sungi Foundation which is based out of Abbottabad, but has offices in Islamabad, Karachi and Lahore as well. It has coordinated with BACIP in the past for seismic resistant construction and rehabilitation in the northern areas where many homes had collapsed because of the frequent tremors and the heavy snowfall and rainfall this February. The organization itself is pretty mobilized and involved with implementing a variety of projects in the field- from sustainable livelihood to energy efficient stoves etc. Their website: www.sungi.org isn't a helpful source though. The best way to contact would be via email. The director's email
address is: imtiaz.alvi@sungi.org.

Although I think funding is in urgent need at this point, design and planning for disaster management is as well. I was in Jerad, which is a village between Kaghan and Paras and for a population of 40,000 people there was only one health clinic with one visiting doctor. For this moment I don't even know if it falls in the category of the 'vanished' villages.
Fund raising is an urgent need but solutions are also required- not only for
shelter, but for health and sanitation facilites and alternative means of
providing energy so that people can survive the harsh winter.
I'm at Cambridge at present and shall try and get involved with some research regarding cold climate shelters at the Shelter centre or with RedR , which is an organization that promotes engineering for disaster relief. If anyone is interested and would like to follow up on projects please let me know.

Please circulate the message below as widely as possible to your friends (Pakistani and non-Pakistani) and encourage them to donate. The need will be tremendous, and we are trying to raise as much money as we can to help.

Thanks,
Tarim

---------------------------

Friends,

This weekend, tragedy struck Pakistan in the most horrific proportions we have seen in our country's history. An earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale has led to widespread destruction, with over 18,000 feared dead and a much higher number injured and homeless. We are all scrambling to figure out how we can best respond to the dire situation.

If you would like to help, please consider making a donation through the Earthquake Relief page at www.DevelopPakistan.org. This is being run by a non-profit called ADP (Association for the Development of Pakistan) that I have worked with quite actively. The site allows you to donate to Edhi Foundation and the President's Earthquake Relief Fund, two agencies that are uniquely qualified to mount the kind of large-scale response that is needed and don't currently have the ability to collect funds online. All donations via the web site are deductible for US tax purposes. There is also information on how to contribute to other NGOs engaged in relief efforts. Over the course of the coming days, we will add more information on how we can all respond to this catastrophe within our communities.

Please forward this e-mail widely and encourage others to help as well.

Thanks,
Tarim

Edhi Foundation
Run by Abdul Sattar Edhi, one of the most respected philanthropists in Pakistam, Edhi Foundation has a long history of providing welfare services and emergency relief throughout Pakistan. Mr. Edhi is personally directing relief efforts from Islamabad right now, and has told ADP that their helicopters have already begun airlifting supplies and medicines to the affected areas.

President's Relief Fund
Given the scale of the disaster and the remoteness of the affected areas, the government is uniquely positioned to provide immediate relief. President Musharraf has set up a fund dedicated to earthquake relief and has encouraged people to contribute to the effort. He has also guaranteed complete transparency and accountability in the use of funds.

With the work week starting, please contact every organization you are or have been affiliated with to see if you can publicize ADP's efforts. Options include:

-Asking your company to make ADP and official recipient of matching funds, or simply a registered charity.
-Sending an e-mail within your company, detailing the tragedy and ADP's ability to accept contributions on behalf of Edhi and the President's Fund.
-Contact your college or Grad school to circulate the info.

You can use Tarim's e-mail as a template for most of this, although you may want to adapt it depending on your audience (desi vs. non-desi, etc..)

Please let the us know how we may assist you. In a couple of hours we will be getting the latest disaster relief maps from the team who's producing them for the UN-OCHA, we'll be posting them up online, will be glad to post copies of them in here. These maps are to be used by OCHA and other pro-bono organizations. Additionally we're in the process of setting up a real-time communications server for the open-acess to information from affected areas.

Thank you, Angelo. Please do keep us posted here. And, tell us a little more about your role, so we can better understand how to integrate your efforts with ours.

In terms of how you can help ADP in our efforts, the best thing you can do right now, in addition to making a contribution, is to continue to spread the word about our efforts and ability to process tax-exempt contributions online for the Edhi Foundation and the President's Fund.

Contributions to our Earthquake Funds have been increasing dramatically every hour. But, it is only a beginning. The more people who know about our work here, the more relief support we will be able to provide in pakistan.

Mr. Sadiq at the Embassy has reiterated that sending supplies to Pakistan is not a good idea. It's better to send cash. PIA is handing everything over to the Embassy for customs clearance and its turning into a big mess.

Stick to money! Collect only monetary donations for right now because everything else is ineffective-sending supplies is no good because they
can be found for cheaper in Pakistan when you factor in trans-Atlantic
transportation costs and disbursement costs when they actually get to
Pakistan.

My cousin is a doctor at PIMS, and they desperately need donations as well. I asked him to send me details of the group who is organizing the transport of patients to them and the doctors to the field hospitals, and details about the individuals involved etc. I'm not sure how you guys feel about that, but I think that some of the smaller donations, which don't have an issue with tax-deductability, need to go somehow to some healthcare providers.

I've been in touch with Brandeis and plan on going there this Friday to get people there involved.

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